It had been a few days that this fireplace (unique, at least as far as I am concerned since in ALMOST HALF A CENTURY of working in the restricted field of antique fireplace NEVER had I come across such a marble) was disturbing my sleep.
And don't start laughing at this disturbance of mine because at a certain age (and mine is very “certain”) and after spending a lifetime among marbles it becomes difficult to have to admit that you not being able to identify a marble, among other things a marble of not very ancient quarrying (there are “Roman” marbles that after two thousand years of laborious studies are still classified by international experts as “of unidentified quarry,” and that's okay, two or three thousand years ago the quarries were not even surveyed, let alone published in Wikipedia!), a marble, that is, that all of us “marble workers” should know as “modern,” quarried the other day.
But nothing to do, think and rethink, search and search, look and look at his slabs, I couldn't get a spider out of the hole until ... I raised the white flag and called a friend, Massimo of Modena, heir to a dynasty of important "marble workers." He has my old age and an experience that is not only his own but also sinks and lives in that of at least two other generations of master marble craftsmen.
Since he retired, HE WORKS MORE THAN EARLIER AND HE'S BUSY, however, even as he knows we'll have four (4 because we've been chattering for 4 hours..) chats that will allow us to relive certain youthful moments, HE FINDS THE TIME TO COME TO SEE THIS FIREPLACE.
I show it to him, all proud of this rarity, and stand waiting for his response.
Massimo, there in front...freezes...he remains as if in a trance...he stares silently and absorbed at those plates that do not want to speak...he is struggling with himself, with his memory...he has sensed something but this something does not surface...blurred image, not well defined... I keep quiet so as not to break his concentration.... “It's a Cream” ***... he finally says and he says it in a confident voice ... this is it, he's on the right track ... he has put one foot on dry land ... “Vigaria … Vigaria Cream ... It's a "trovante", though**** it's not the classic Vigaria, it's a finder...”
Goodness gracious, I would have kissed him so much I was happy to have untied the knot that was oppressing me, instead I just patted him on the back saying... “It took you, though, some time, eh, I can see you've aged!!!”
He was right, the Maximus, it was indeed Crema Vigaria and I, on the other hand, called myself an asshole, I should have figured out on my own, and right away, where that marble came from because you should know (and those who don't believe me are invited to my house for a good nocino produced in my wife's squatter distillery) that in my house, the floors of the living area and the stairs all are in a marble “relative” of Vigaria, a Portuguese “crema” at the time chosen for its warm and reassuring background tone.
Anyway, it was a nice half-day, the reunion with Massimo, and for that I thank our fantastic and very unique (because not even Berlusconi with all his money will ever have a fireplace with that marble) Art Deco fireplace .
ITS DISCOVERY WAS IN THE HISTORIC CENTER OF THE ANCIENT (IT IS OVER A THOUSAND YEARS OLD) CITY OF EINDHOVEN, NETHERLANDS, ITS DATE OF BIRTH IS BETWEEN 1925 AND 1935, ITS STATE OF PRESERVATION IS PERFECT.
*** “A cream” stands for “a marble with a natural cream-colored paste, of the cream family, which has nothing to do with whites, which take on the cream nuance only when they have important surface outcrops of certain ‘intruders,’ such as, for example, sulfur or iron in Carrara White.
***** The word “Trovante,” when speaking of marbles or stones, generally refers to itinerant, wandering boulders, mostly moved by the force of a glacier, sea waves or major natural upheavals. Insiders in the field of marbles have long since appropriated this term and use it to define blocks or parts (“boulders”) of stone material that have, shall we say, “gone mad. To clarify further: Imagine a marble quarry in which, in a certain specific and limited spot, there is a “batch” of marble a little different from everything else.. You want because in that spot two billion years ago there were trees, or fossils, or particular minerals, well, these “intruding” ingredients caused a variation in the soup, perhaps making it less or more flavorful, but certainly still different from the rest of the menu in that quarry.
The Trovante, in short, is something that cannot be catalogued, a splinter gone mad, in our case, a happily gone mad splinter.
